“beyond wandpoint” 123b by gingerbred
Jun. 17th, 2020 02:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beyondwandpoint“11 13g Thurs - Out 2” Part 2
Severus, Slytherins: Draco Malfoy, Theo Nott, Blaise Zabini, Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Daphne Greengrass, Harper Hutchinson, Torsten Touchstone, Ella Wilkins, Astoria Greengrass, Tomasina Touchstone, Hufflepuffs: Ernie Macmillan, Others: Rita Skeeter, Riona Rosier
Mentioned briefly: Slytherins: Aaron Avery, Róisín Rosier, Akira Murakami, Ravenclaws: Morag MacDougal, Hufflepuffs: Justin Finch-Fetchley, Megan Jones, Others: Crookshanks, Sunny, Rory Rosier, Marnie Edgecombe, Harrison Hedley
Originally Published: 2020-06-17 on LJ / DW
Chapter: 123 part 2
The original version of this chapter exceeded livejournal's maximum post length. It's been split in two parts.
THIS CHAPTER IS A TWO-PARTER.
**SCROLL DOWN AND READ THE OTHER PART FIRST**. (123a LJ / DW)
ALSO, THE LAST CHAPTER WAS A TWO-PARTER. DID YOU READ BOTH PARTS?
Now that everyone is clear of the lav, Draco sets about Finiteing the various Protegos. It's more than just a question of housekeeping. The regret all too clear in his voice - he's hardly the monster his Housemates often seem to take him for - he softly asks, "Theo? Mate? Do you think you can Summon your toes?"
Theo's expression is pained, which strikes Draco as an eminently reasonable response under the circumstances.
Theo palms his wand and tries, neither of them have ever attempted an Accio for this sort of thing before. It works, which shouldn't be too surprising, something could hardly be more his by nature. Draco intercepts the flying appendages with a Ebublio Jinx, Tomasina blanching as they fly past her. The conjured bubble seals shut over them, enclosing them in a sanitary ball. "I'll, um, see to this for you, shall I?"
Theo only nods, not trusting himself to speak, as Draco slips the parcel into an extended pocket.
All three are relieved when it disappears from sight.
Daph is exceedingly proud of herself. Vince had been a bit of a challenge. This? So much more so. Gregory being Gregory isn't the least bit fussed, but Daphne is frankly mortified just by the sight of him. Fig leaf or no, at this distance the magnitude of his... endowment is abundantly clear, to say nothing of the piercing, and apparently he engages in a bit of creative manscaping she'd have really rather known nothing about. Ever. While he isn't above that sort of thing - Gregory? Of course not - that fails to consider the fact he'd aggressively Scourgified himself only yesterday, and not to belittle Madam Pomfrey's considerable talents, but things are still kind of... sorting themselves out.
With his weight all one one leg, to say nothing of the preponderance of the goo, her options are a little more limited here. A couple of Diffindos, and a Wingardium Leviosa later, and she has his pants in place. She needs to hold them there with one hand as she magically knits the garment back together and then moves on to his trousers.
When Tori then Finites his fig leaf, she's a good bit gentler than she had been with Vince. Disconcertingly, very, it feels almost like a caress as it wraps itself softly around him and vanishes. Given her comparatively young age and her status as a Greengrass pureblood, Gregory's almost thankful when the throbbing in his foot keeps him from making any all too revealing noises. Astoria is going to be someone to watch out for; he's quietly certain of it. Whoever is fortunate enough to land her is going to have his hands full with the witch.
Draco and Tomasina begin to see to clothing Theo - an easier affair by far, especially as he's capable of helping - and the seventh year Prefect is soon able to leave her to it. He starts to gather their school supplies, first applying an Incarcerous to the individual stacks and then Reducioing them all and putting them into one of the many pockets of his robe. Vince's socks and shoes and Gregory's wand follow next. Draco's begun to feel the strain of the morning, he's completely lost count of the number of spells he's performed, and with Harper's collapse in mind, prophylactically he helps himself to one of his Chocolate Frogs in passing, feeling vaguely superior at how much better he's held up than the sixth year.
People are forever discounting the role physical condition plays in one's ability to perform magic.
Almost as if the gods were listening, his less than generous thoughts are immediately... rewarded when he opens his Frog...
Dumbledore.
How typical. Harper had been two for two on Slytherins - from Draco's Frogs, it should be noted; talk about adding insult to injury - and he gets Dumbledore. Never pleasant, to be sure, but since the Dark Lord's... assignment, it's an especially loaded card.
Brilliant.
The complete and utter misery of his morning keeps Theo from becoming too het up about Tomasina's proximity as she helps him dress - she's currently applying a Reducio to one of his socks and shoes which he then pockets for all too obvious reasons - or about the abundance of girls for some reason present in their rooms this morning. In fact, it may help that there are so many of them, really, and the boys quite evidently are in no shape to pose any kind of threat whatsoever. Theo still doesn't trust Vince as far as he could throw him - without magic, to be clear - and he's none too sure about Blaise, for that matter, either. But the Beater simply sits there on Draco's bed and doesn't appear able to budge from it. Good. And the Keeper seems to have problems of his own...
Ella sets about making a sling for Blaise's injured arm, and Tor once again has to battle his envy. It's exacerbated when Blaise shoots him an excessively smug look over the pretty sixth year's head - the more perceptive are well aware where Tor's interest lies - but he returns it with such heat, Blaise decides to move on to easier prey.
"The Wheeze was in the soap?" He starts in.
"Yes," Vince answers, the accusation clear in the single word. He can't help thinking it was pretty stupid to remind them Blaise had missed that fact, completely, but there's something a little predatory in the Keeper's tone, and Vince isn't convinced he needs another slanging match just now. Not after the morning he's had.
"Then how on earth did you get it in your hair?" Blaise asks Gregory, the mockery fairly obvious to all but its target. With Tori's support, Daph had been able to get one shoe on the boy. For the second, the truly problematic one, Daphne cautiously Engorgios the footwear and then puts a Cushioning Charm on it - sadly so necessary for most of a witch's dress shoes, she knows the Charm only too well - and she carefully slips it on to his bandaged foot.
"Well I scrubbed it with the soap, obviously," Gregory quite characteristically fails to see the issue, and also not the brightest, wonders a little about Blaise's capacity for logical deduction, not altogether meanly, albeit in simpler terms.
"What kind of idiot uses soap on their hair??" The derision is clearer now, even to Gregory. It's just as well Róisín isn't here or she'd probably question its use on his face, too.
"Blaise, you can walk?" Draco interrupts before this gets out of hand. He still has vague hopes of getting some breakfast, although he's begun to suspect they'll prove overly optimistic. The universe does seem to have conspired against him as far as meals go.
That might only be the tip of the iceberg, really.
"And cast spells, too," Blaise replies, still smugly. Draco ignores it. Somehow they're all being especially tiresome this morning. Which may be par for the course, now that he considers it. Severus knows that feeling only too well.
"Right. Then a round of Petrificuses and Mobilicorpuses for the rest and Ferulas to lead them, and we can take them to to the Infirmary." He'll be hanged before he has to resort to another one of Gregory's Muscley Müsli bars.
Vince almost cries. "Not a Mobilicorpus!"
"Vince, you can't stand let alone walk." A reasonable objection, he feels, as the boy hasn't moved significantly from Draco's bed this whole time. But the whole scenario is far too close to Tuesday night's return from the Infirmary, albeit in reverse, for this to sound like a good idea to the Beater. To be honest, the recounting of it had served as inspiration for the suggestion. Draco is forced to negotiate with him, finally agreeing that he can use a broom if he bloody well pleases. Merlin's fuzzy ballsack. At this point if Vince were to fall from his Nimbus 2001, Draco wouldn't feel pity in the least. But after the fall down the Grand Staircase Saint Potter and the Weasel had caused him to take Sunday evening, a tumble from a broom really fails to compare.
"What about Harper?" Daphne asks a little hesitantly, and Ella and Tori both smile fondly to the themselves. After a last Cleaning Charm to her uniform, Ella gathers up her robes and puts them on.
"He can follow on his own," Draco replies, but not too curtly this time.
"He told me to get going," Tor tries to reassure her. "Not to wait. I assume that applies to the lot of you as well." She doesn't look happy about it, but offers no further resistance, merely goes to the lavatory door and shrinks the towels she'd crafted before using a Wingardium Leviosa to bring them to her. A quick Folding Charm, and then she puts them in the school bag still slung across her body. This will give her a chance to improve on them anyway. Surely Harper won't mind...
"Alright, are we ready?" Draco takes a last look around their room.
When they finally fail to object, will wonders never cease, he gets to work, firing off a couple of spells in rapid succession. His Mobilicorpus is good, not as good as Harper's, but good. He places one on Theo and one on Gregory, and at his instruction, Ella follows with the Ferulas they will use to lead the boys, two on Theo's arms, four on Gregory, one on each of his limbs, because the Wheeze makes transporting him all the more precarious. He assigns everyone their positions. Ella and Tomasina will take the lead, managing the bandages on Gregory's hands. Tor and Draco himself will take up the rear guard, leaving him better able to keep an eye on Gregory's progress and intervene if something - else - starts to go wrong. (Tor, ever so typically, views the arrangement more as being able to keep an eye on Ella. Unsurprisingly he had been especially easy to convince to cooperate in that configuration.) Vince and Blaise will make their own ways, although Draco encourages Blaise to lay a hand ('I only have the one available anyway...') on Vince's broom ('oo er...') to ensure he steers properly, and Daphne and Tori will manage Theo, much to Daph's relief.
"You should make certain Gregory stays well above you," Daphne warns them. Not everyone seems to understand why. "Those are only Glamours over the spots of... goo. You don't want them accidentally touching your robes."
"Right, neither your robes nor anything else," Draco takes her cue, now more convinced than ever the rear is the best spot for him and thankful for the generally high ceilings in the castle. The stairs to the common room should be a misery, and the uphill passageway out of the Dungeons with all the Snitches mounted on the ceiling will prove interesting, but as long as they keep a good distance from one another and Gregory, and the lines taut...
"After you," he gestures to the others, and they take their places, beginning their odd procession out of the dorms.
Once they're all in the corridor, Draco closes and wards the door. Turning to his roommates, he commands Theo, Blaise and Vince, "Give me your wands." Gregory's he's already procured as he gathered their things. Theo has slight problems pulling his from its sheath, because the girls have kept the leads on him held tightly - promising, if momentarily inconvenient, and Draco becomes a little more hopeful about those stairs. It takes a bit of concentration to pull the adjustment to his wards off silently and wandlessly, the morning had been quite a strain, but he needs to key the wards to the wands so his roommates will have access, and a sensible amount of caution dictates he not make the spell too obvious in front of so many witnesses. It would rather defeat the purpose.
Ella and the fifth years try to decide if they should be offended, Daphne is too busy planning alterations to the towels in her bag, and Tor is frankly amused at the sight after the others had so kindly helped them, but has to admit the state of the lads might justify such precautions.
Whatever else, Draco's no fool.
In light of the events of Friday evening, etched all the more indelibly in his thoughts by the decidedly non-trivial consequences for both himself and Miss Granger, Severus can perhaps be forgiven for immediately thinking the worst when he first feels the disturbances to his wards. And to be fair, that corresponds more accurately to his life experiences.
Miss Wilkins is the first to cross his wards - at a dead run - scarcely a heartbeat later, he can make out Miss Touchstone; Prefects the both of them, and their identities absolutely not in question. The issue, and he finds it quite alarming, his bias on display, is there are eight individuals in close pursuit, Nott and Malfoy amongst them. He really needs to see to setting the wards to identify the other seventh year boys, because he has a very, very bad feeling that they are members of that pursuit party.
He isn't wrong.
Wand instantly in hand, he continues on his path to the door, with more urgency now, Banishing the books he's carrying to the dining table as he goes. He warns the half-Kneazle to stay clear, and without pausing performs the Charm that renders their door transparent to his sight...
And then promptly freezes in place.
Presumably there's a good explanation for this...
... he just can't imagine what it is.
No. He hasn't a clue. Sunny's excitement from before immediately comes to mind, this... whatever this is, would no doubt be the explanation for it.
Now he's almost sorry he hadn't asked.
The two young women are indeed in the lead, evidently towing Goyle, who ever so naturally is spread eagled and floating in the air like some bizarre parade balloon with a Golden Snitch affixed to his chest, bobbing over the heads of two of his wranglers, Malfoy and the other Touchstone, who are hot on the ladies' heels. Directly behind them, both Misses Greengrass have Nott between them, from his unaccustomed height, he's doing his best impression of a vertical balloon in counterpoint to Goyle's horizontal rendition, and they're - quite logically, he is sure - closely followed by Zabini directing Crabbe on his broom with questionable skill.
He almost succumbs to the temptation to ask Sunny what had precipitated this, but doesn't wish to give him the satisfaction. It should only make the little elf near insufferable for days to come. And the chances Severus remains ignorant of whatever events had transpired are so improbable as not to be worth considering.
Still. Very tempting.
He stands there waiting for a knock, but it never comes. Instead the cavalcade moves past his chambers at speed, and he stands there staring after it until it's vanished from sight.
He should probably get going... In light of that strange display, it's unquestionably only a matter of time before someone comes to seek him in the Great Hall.
Merlin. Some days...
Rita Skeeter had begun with a Sonorous, not her usual modus operandi - she much prefers stealth, but the idea had been to get the parties within the house talking about the subjects currently of interest to her and to find a way to listen in as they did so. She'd set out early to make sure she'd catch the Rosiers at home before they left for the day, and had marched rather obviously back and forth in front of their property yelling for Rory to give her an interview - the tooter, the sweeter - to discuss his sister Rosemary and the bonding that had led to her untimely death those seventeen years ago. The more outrageous her demands, the better. She hadn't expected they'd take her up on it, of course not. She was rather counting on upsetting them enough that it would become the sole topic of discussion instead, and preferably heated at that. It did so provide the very best quotes.
In retrospect, perhaps she should have found that opening first - she'd banked too heavily on the ease of doing so - because she's having no luck whatsoever now. Very frustrating. For the most part, she relies on Wheezes more so than charms. She's heard the Slytherins have a variety of Perception Charms at their disposal that might come in useful for this sort of thing - and in fact they may be precisely what's thwarting her at present - but she's always done alright for herself with aides like Extendable Ears and her beetle form.
Well, almost always.
Besides, what she doesn't know, she isn't afraid to... invent.
Disillusioned, she'd circled the house, twice, to no avail, even Ears pressed against windowpanes had yielded no joy, and she now ends the Charm, shifting into her Animagus form and taking flight looking for ways in...
They're all closed.
The blasted house simply affords her no chance to eavesdrop. She hadn't really expected an open window at this time of year, but an unwarded chimney - preferably not also in use - hadn't seemed too much of an ask. The old families always were problematic. Those who had taken a more active role in the last war even more so. For one, they tended to be more cautious, more aware of the vulnerabilities that existed. For another, they needn't have taken the measures themselves. It was often sufficient if one of their forebears had in these ancestral homes. As it is, she's rebuffed at every angle.
Suitably irritated, she Transfigures herself back into human form, reappearing at the front door, applies another Sonorous and shouts some more. Variations on "You'll want to get your story out there before someone else does," "Take control of the narrative," "I'm your best bet to be heard," and "The Daily Prophet pays a pretty Galleon for good stories," are perennial faves. People, she finds, tend to be gullible enough to believe them anyway.
If all else fails, she has few qualms about making this a war of attrition. She'll simply keep at it until she's worn them down; she has little doubt that she'll hold up longer than the couple inside. Assuming they still are and haven't Flooed off somewhere to escape her, that is. Always a possibility, and what sources are for. Marnie Edgecombe, one of her old roommates from Hogwarts, works as a regulator at the Floo Network, and she'd been a terrific help over the years along those lines. At any rate, Rita can say with certainty that the Rosiers haven't dropped the Anti-Apparition Charms. Merlin knows, she'd kept trying them.
It doesn't take long before a window over the front entrance opens, far less time than Rita would have wagered even, and she briefly hopes she might get that improbable interview after all...
And the next thing she knows the coldest imaginable Augamenti rains down on her with force, causing her elegantly coiffed curls to droop about her face and become stuck to her cheeks at rakish angles. She stands there sputtering, shivering, still too stunned to even apply a Warming Charm at the shock, and Riona Rosier sticks her head out of the window to yell at her, "I wouldn't expect you of all people to have any respect for Rory's family's loss, but you'll get naught but more of the same here, Rita. Go peddle your lies to someone else." Presumably it doesn't help that she and Rita had been the same year at school as well. Familiarity has been known to breed contempt. Hmm. And come to think of it, Rory had never liked her much either...
Before Rita can even begin to offer excuses or enticements - she was still trying to decide which might be more fruitful - the window slams shut and there's a ripple to the wards, and the next things she knows, she's been thrown clear of the property line.
Hmm again.
It will take more than that to deter her.
The picture of self-confident resolution, she rights her spectacles, applies an assortment of Drying Charms to her person, and magically cleans and presses her robes as she plots her next move. When she's finished, she withdraws a bejewelled compact from her purse to assess the damage to her makeup in its mirror and then shrieks in anger. The flames of that anger are predictably only fanned when her reflection proceeds to begin pointing at her and laughing hysterically. Riona, that witch, had evidently used a Hexed Auguamenti, as Rita's makeup is a horror and her curls haven't retaken their accustomed shape at all despite the manifold charms ensuring they should. No, they hang limp and depressing all about her face, and the colour! Gods! Gone is the lovely blonde and in its place remains a mousy brown suspicious minds might suspect was truer to her natural shade; it's been so long since she's seen it that Rita can't even recall the tone herself. Although she's finding the unfamiliar streaks of grey especially cruel...
Riona had had a knack for Beauty Charms even as a student. Presumably Beauty Hexes went hand in hand with that.
Well Rita can't be seen like this, that much is obvious.
Decided, she fixes her Makeup Charms and scratches any and all further plans for the morning, she'll need to stop by the hairdresser's first. A quick Tempus confirms Curl Up and Dye won't have opened yet at this hour. She has no doubt, however, that upon seeing the damage they'll be willing to squeeze her in once they do open even without a previous appointment.
It's not as though she could have planned for this. Although in the back of her mind is an idea that she might wish to look into the Shield Hats that Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes had on offer when next she replenishes her supply of Extendable Ears.
With a twist of her body and a loud 'crack', she Apparates off to Hogsmeade to wait for Harrison to open his salon.
Ernie Macmillan is running a little late to breakfast, nothing too cataclysmic of course, but he is the Head Boy and prefers to be punctual, even to events that don't formally require it. Lead by example, he always says. But he'd wanted to stop by the Infirmary and see after Justin. Especially after the sad news about Megan withdrawing from school, it seems all the more important for the members of their House to look after one another. Properly. Surely that behooves Ernie's position even if they weren't the very best of friends (as they very obviously are, but that wasn't the point). And of course as a Muggle-born, Justin could conceivably have needed a little reassuring that Madam Pomfrey was almost certain to have him, and his two heads, sorted... any day now. One quite naturally can't expect the Muggle born and raised to know about the full capabilities of wizarding medicine, to say nothing of the ramifications of esoteric hexes (not that Ernie had been able to speak to that in the case specific either, but it was a question of principle).
So he'd stopped by to comfort his friend and had interrupted his meal.
Justin, trying to eat with his two heads...
Goodness.
Quite honestly, it may have put Ernie off his feed altogether. Perhaps he should have gone after the meal - his, to be clear - although he's not convinced that would have improved his situation considering...
His weighty thoughts on such matters are interrupted when the oddest display he's seen in the castle - and goodness knows there had been an excellent contender just this week - shoots around the next corner from the direction of the stairwell and races past him.
Initially there's a good deal of commotion, and he considers deducting points for it, particularly as it's two Slytherin Prefects who first come into view. Worse even yet, it soon becomes clear they're running. Thoroughly inappropriate and unacceptable in the hallways. But then an airborne Goyle bobs round the corner, and Ernie completely forgets what he was objecting to.
If they were going to select one of their number to be paraded about in such a fashion, Goyle is quite obviously the best choice for a humanoid dirigible plum - purely for his physique, one understands; his character and intellect are apparently both assailable - but he very decidedly has something of a Roman statue about him. Had Ernie heretofore failed to notice the boy's form, frankly difficult to miss despite the school robes and oft enviously discussed amongst the Ravenclaw Quidditch team members, the very excellent look the entire school had enjoyed of the boy's bum yesterday at lunch would have certainly more than addressed that failing.
A Snitch fluttering up a storm on Goyle's chest is presumably their version of the cherry on top. Curious.
Soon Malfoy and Touchstone appear, well that's three of their Prefects now... Except Goyle just keeps bob, bob, bobbing as they run, and it's ever so distracting...
Nott behaves much the same when he appears next, floating up down up down, between the ever so charming Greengrass ladies, the lucky lad - not that the elder is available anymore to the best of the Hufflepuff's knowledge, but all the same - and Ernie stands there wondering just what the Slytherins get up to amongst themselves, and not for the first time this week even.
The proverbial spell is finally broken when Crabbe comes flying around the corner - literally this time, broomstick and all - yelling at Zabini that he's making it impossible to steer his Nimbus whatsit. (The obvious answer there, of course, is that he shouldn't be flying in the corridors in the first place. Troglodyte. Briefly Ernie contemplates taking points for that.) Crabbe loses control in the curve and yanks the Keeper clean off his feet, Zabini holding on one handed for dear life until he reconnects with the floor rather jarringly. (Ernie winces just at the sight, his knees twinging in sympathetic pain.) Indignantly, Zabini fires something back about Crabbe doing a piss poor job of steering as a whole - after that display, Ernie's only too inclined to agree - to which the Beater responds, "Fuck's sake, Blaise. You try it one-handed." Malfoy, shirking his job as a Prefect entirely, merely mutters something about stealing the Italian's line.
The obscenity shakes Ernie out of it enough to finally take five points from them for, "Language."
Largely unfazed - heavens, they expected it - they simply rush past him, evidently making for the Infirmary he'd just left.
And now he feels ever so slightly a cad for the point deduction. He could have let them off with a warning... He silently wishes them 'Godspeed' as he continues to make his way to breakfast.